Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

This book has been banned by the public schools in another city in this state. According to the wire service article that I read "a parent pointed out a passage in Neverwhere that describes a sexual encounter and uses a curse word." This apparently is the first complaint in the nine years that the book has been in the curriculum. I am a devoted fan of banned books, so I decided immediately to read it and discover what the fuss was all about. I believe that someone said "hell" somewhere in the first few pages, but I did not find "graphic detail - an intimate situation between two adults." Well -- he did kiss a succubus, but was rescued before things got too far along. Apparently the torture and butchery of several people, succubi, a fallen angel, and such were less disturbing to the parent than the kiss. Or perhaps the parent in question had not actually read the book and took the word of her daughter who had maybe fallen behind in the assigned reading. Maybe I should read it again concentrating on locating the prurient material.

Seriously, I probably won't reread it any time soon. It has all the Gaiman blending of the real and unreal leaving the distinct impression that the unreal is more real than the real - but it seems to lack the light touch and quirkiness that I have come to associate with Gaiman's work. However, I did not find material likely to corrupt the minds of American teenagers.

A rather boring young man, Richard Mayhew, through an act of humanity, stumbles into a shadow world imposed on modern London. The denizens of this world refer to it as London Below, and it does exist in part in the tunnels and sewers and such below the city proper, but it also overlaps "London Above." Inhabitants of London Below are not seen or noticed by those living in London Above - but they are there. Metaphor, perhaps, for the invisible people inhabiting our own world or for the human talent for ignoring that which makes us uncomfortable.